


Return to The Demonic Goatman's Bridge

by onedamnangryfrog



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Watcher Entertainment RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s03e04 The Demonic Goatman's Bridge, Getting Together, M/M, what do you call case fic for the boys? investigation fic?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:15:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27582580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onedamnangryfrog/pseuds/onedamnangryfrog
Summary: This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved, the boys return to the site of one of their most popular investigations, Old Alton Bridge, aka The Goatman’s Bridge, in Denton, Texas.
Relationships: Ryan Bergara/Shane Madej
Comments: 9
Kudos: 36





	Return to The Demonic Goatman's Bridge

**Author's Note:**

  * For [babyshoeskeleton](https://archiveofourown.org/users/babyshoeskeleton/gifts).



> This is for my beloved spouse Kit, who told me I should write about the boys going back to their bridge, and for my sweet friend zaphodthebb, who is always willing to listen to me yell about the Ghoul Boys and encouraged me when I thought this was terrible and that I'd never finish it. Happy birthday, hon, I hope it's been an amazing day and that you enjoy this!
> 
> Big thanks to Liz for the beta 💜

_This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved, we return to the site of one of our most popular investigations, Old Alton Bridge, aka The Goatman’s Bridge, in Denton, Texas._

**SHANE** : “Goin’ back, baby!”

**RYAN** : “You don’t have to sound so happy about it, but yes, this week we are revisiting the site of one of our most popular investigations, The Goatman’s Bridge.”

**SHANE** : “And why _are_ we going back, Ryan? Just wanna check up on our property?”

**RYAN** : “I should never have agreed to put my name in on your shit. Actually, reports of activity at the bridge have amped up quite a bit since our investigation. Some fans messaged that they went to check out the bridge and the surrounding woods after the episode aired and had a really freaky experience, seeing glowing eyes, experiencing loss of time…”

**SHANE** : “ ...And I’m sure that none of our fans would ever engage in any activities that might explain hallucinations, blackouts--”

  
**RYAN** : “Shut up, Shane. It’s not just our fans, reports from other sources have detailed even more intense experiences than I’d read about before our original investigation.”

**SHANE** : “Hogwash, Ryan. Nothing happened to us when I literally did everything I could to provoke it. Because there’s nothing to provoke.”

**RYAN** : “Actually, the most compelling new evidence is a video, and it pretty directly concerns you.”

**SHANE** : “Oh, _really_?”

**_Spirit box static_ **

**_FEMALE VOICE_ ** _: ‘Who’s here with us right now? Why have you been so much more aggressive lately?’_

**_GROWLING VOICE:_ ** _‘_ **_SHANE_ ** _’_

**SHANE** : “And what’s that supposed to prove?”

**RYAN** : “Fuck off, that was clearly your name, are you really gonna act like that’s a coincidence?”

**SHANE** : “Maybe it said ‘Shame.’ Very similar. And even you’ve said that one word doesn’t mean anything, it’s just random radio gibberish. Now let’s go check out our bridge.”

***

Immediately after stepping onto the bridge, Shane knocked three times on the nearest truss and yelled, “Hey Goatman! The boys are back! Did you miss us? Been keeping our bridge warm for us?” 

Ryan scrubbed a hand over his face and huffed out a sigh. 

“What’s the plan here, Ryan? We already conquered this thing once, are we here to gloat? Get him to challenge us, take his bridge back? Put me in, Coach, I’m ready to play!” 

Shane shifted from foot to foot as he spoke, comically exaggerated, swinging an imaginary bat to cap it off. Ryan might have been impressed with the vague-ass sports reference if he wasn’t so goddamn irritated by the Shane of it all.

Ryan wrung his hands. “Jesus Christ, we’re not here to square up with what might be a fucking demon, Shane. Especially since things have definitely gotten more intense since we were here. Honestly, I think we need to try to make amends to whatever this thing is.” Ryan ducked his head slightly, preemptively bracing himself for Shane’s mocking.

Shane rolled his eyes and assumed his best ‘I can’t believe I put up with this shit’ expression. “Really, Ryan? We came all the way out here to apologize to the Goatman?”

“Fuck you, dude,” Ryan slung the backpack from his back around to his front and began riffling through its contents. After a few seconds of searching, he pulled out an aerosol can and began shaking it. “One of the things your dumb ass said when we were here before was that people would be putting your name in graffiti here. And of course, because that’s who our fans are, they actually have. So we’re gonna cover it up.”

Shane’s shoulders shook with laughter, face all crinkled eyes and smirk. “Ryan, you might have outdumbed yourself again with this one.”

Ryan rolled his eyes. “Just help me find the graffiti, dude.”

Ryan had been tagged in enough pictures to know roughly what he was looking for. Panning his flashlight over the bridge in the darkness, he found “Shane & Ryan’s Bridge,” in faded but still visible black Sharpie, fairly quickly and sprayed over it as thoroughly as he could. He kept looking, Shane as unhelpful as Ryan had figured he would be, until he found “hey demons, it’s me, ya boy” (they didn’t even spell it right, c’mon) and covered it as well. Those were the ones he was aware of, and the darkness made searching for anything further a little too time-consuming, so he figured he could call it good.

“Are ya done?”

“No thanks to you, yes. I thought we’d do a spirit box session in the woods, since that’s where a lot of the recent activity has happened, including that video.”  
  
“Probably because Goatman doesn’t dare set hoof on our bridge anymore.”

Ryan felt he could only say ‘shut up, Shane’ so many times in one episode, lest he risk their fans getting alcohol poisoning from drinking games, so he pushed the urge down yet again. “I don’t know why I expected any cooperation from you on this. Just come on.”

They headed off into the woods, Shane loping pleasantly while Ryan trudged with determination despite his terror at what they might be getting into, as per usual.

*** 

Once they’d made it far enough into the woods that the trees surrounded them, Ryan stopped, fumbled through his bag once more, and pulled out the spirit box. Shane braced himself for the racket, an involuntary yelp still escaping his lips at the first crackle, and Ryan began to speak.

“I guess I don’t have to explain what this is, you’ve seen it before. Is someone here with us right now? Did you say Shane’s name when someone else came through here with one of these?”

Suddenly, Shane heard a cracking, ripping noise. It was jarring, unnatural, not at all like the jerky static of the spirit box. He whipped his head around, whispered, “did you hear that,” and barely had the time to wonder if the cultists really were going to get them this time, all before he realized that Ryan was nowhere to be seen.

“Ryan??? What the hell, where’d you go?”

Shane did a 360 turn, noting with some alarm that he was now completely alone--no Ryan, no crew, just himself, inexplicably. The woods had fallen eerily quiet. Not only was the spirit box babble gone, but there was also none of the ambient noise that should have been present in the woods at night. No insects, no animals, just complete, enveloping silence.

At least the cultists probably weren’t around after all, he thought ridiculously, his brain trying to diffuse the situation with humor even with no one but himself to hear it.

With no other plan, Shane walked in the direction they’d come from. He shouted Ryan’s name every few minutes, hearing nothing but a vague echo of his own voice in return.

As the bridge came back into Shane’s view, he saw a figure standing in the middle. He half gasped, half sighed with relief at the sight, opened his mouth to call out to Ryan when his brain briefly registered with alarm-- _Not Ryan_. 

The silhouette was all wrong. It stopped Shane in his tracks for a moment before he came to his senses, moving toward the figure, laughing softly both at his own reaction and at what he was seeing. The figure was more or less man-shaped, minus the head, which he had to admit was rather convincingly goat-like. 

“Oh my god, Ryan, is that you up there? Where were you hiding that thing?” Shane shouted, laughter growing louder.

As Shane got closer, though, the laughing stopped, his eyes widening. It couldn’t be, but like he’d always told Ryan, he’d have to believe what he could see with his own eyes, what was right in front of him. 

It was difficult to discern the exact height of the creature--for that’s what it was, not an animal, not a man--from where Shane was standing, but it appeared to be around Shane’s own height. Bizarrely, the first thought to enter Shane’s mind was ‘ _I thought he’d be taller.’_

Despite every atom of his body telling him to turn the other way, to pretend that he hadn’t seen anything, to keep looking for Ryan without confronting the thing in front of him, Shane kept walking toward the bridge. This might be the only way to get the answers he was looking for, to find Ryan, to get them out of here whole and ( _please, please, please_ ) alive.

When he found himself directly in front of the creature, he saw that he was more or less correct in his assessment of its height, only having to look up just slightly to see the glowing empty eyes Ryan had described from his research. He swallowed, tried to gather up courage and bravado he felt short on for once, and opened his mouth to speak, only to be spoken to before the words could come out.

The growling voice, too, was exactly as described. “Shane Madej. You took something of mine, so I have now taken something of yours.”

Shane didn’t bother arguing that Ryan didn’t belong to anyone but himself, much less to Shane. “I didn’t take anything, we didn’t--it was a game, a joke, you weren’t supposed to be _real_. Where’s Ryan?” His hands moved wildly as he spoke, panic overtaking him despite his best efforts at maintaining composure.

“He’s nowhere you can reach him.” The Goatman’s voice rumbled like thunder, chilling Shane to the core.

“What do you want, please, how do I get him back here?” Shane hated how shaky and wet his voice sounded, so quiet compared to the booming growl of the Goatman.

The creature glared at Shane, those awful, empty eyes piercing through him. “I want what is mine.”  
  
“The bridge?? It’s yours, it was always yours, I never wanted it, it was all for show, for laughs, this is the first time we’ve even seen it since!” Shane stammered frantically, now shaking with terror.

“I’ve known no peace since you came here. People come here and dance on this bridge, write your name on it, taunt me. There’s no respect for me here anymore.”

Shane could practically see himself in the space next to them on the bridge like an apparition, dancing and yelling at the Goatman, taking the bit further than necessary like always. If he’d fucking known, if he could have ever imagined...

“Please, I don’t know how to fix it, but Ryan didn’t ask for this, all that was my doing. Anything he said or did to you was my influence. Please, bring him back. Take me instead if it makes it even, just...bring him back.” 

Shane was completely out of bravado now, tears slowly rolling down his face. He couldn’t hold it anymore; the grief, the despair, the overwhelming guilt of knowing that whatever was happening to Ryan right now was no one’s fault but Shane’s.

The Goatman sneered, his already grotesque face even more hideous with the shift. “What do I want with you? You’re no one. You’ve caused me nothing but trouble. Perhaps I should send you away as well,” 

Shane tried not to visibly react, but couldn’t help hoping. At least if he were sent away, he’d presumably be where Ryan was, maybe they could find a way out together…

The Goatman laughed as if he could hear exactly what Shane was thinking. Fuck, maybe he could. Shane shivered at the thought.

The creature shook his head decisively before speaking again. “No, I don’t think I will. You would clearly rather be anywhere with your _friend_ than granted your freedom alone.” His inflection of the word ‘friend’ dripped with such derision that Shane was absolutely sure that he could see into his head, that he knew every single thing he felt for Ryan.

Shane was completely at a loss. He didn’t have any cards left to play, out of his depth in a way he’d never contemplated was possible. Somehow, he summoned an idea, probably not a particularly good one, but the only thing he had.

“Wait! There is something else you can take from me. From both of us! Bring Ryan back, and I’ll admit that I found proof, that I can’t be the skeptic anymore. It’ll torpedo the show, we’ve both said it’s all over if I believe, the whole dynamic’s ruined,” Shane stammered through the speech to the point that he feared not being understood, frantic and desperate.

“The show is Ryan’s baby, it’ll destroy him to lose it. And without the show, we lose what ties us together. We’ll just be two guys who work together, not best friends...not anything, really.” Shane couldn’t stand pouring it all out like that, baring his stupid fears and feelings out loud, leaving himself vulnerable to more mocking by this awful creature. 

But if humiliating himself might convince him, there was no other choice to make. Nothing else mattered if Ryan wasn’t here.

The Goatman just stared down at him, seemingly unmoved, not speaking. 

Shane humbled himself one last time, knowing it probably wouldn’t make a difference but feeling like he had to try.

“Please, please, bring him back. He’s got so many people who need him, don’t take him away from them just because of me.” Shane couldn’t stand the thought, had no idea how the hell he would explain any of this to their coworkers, much less to Ryan’s parents, his brother...everyone loved Ryan, and they would hate Shane for coming back without him. And he’d deserve it.

“If you go back on what you’ve promised, you will regret it forever, Shane Madej.” The Goatman said, then spoke no more. He waved a hand, dismissive as if swatting a fly, then he was gone. At the same moment the creature seemingly blinked out of existence, Shane again heard the cracking, ripping noise from earlier, the awful noise that he now knew was caused by a literal fucking rip in the fabric of reality. Then Ryan appeared out of thin air in front of him.

“Oh my god--Shane?”

“Ryan--”

Whatever words Shane might have come up with were gone with the feeling of Ryan’s face slamming into his chest, his arms wrapping around him and squeezing with all their considerable strength. He could feel his shirt growing wet where Ryan’s face pressed against him. The silence stretched between them, no sound but Ryan’s breathing, sobbing, as he continued to cling to Shane.

When Shane couldn’t just stand there with the silence and the feelings anymore, he spoke up, trying to project composure where he felt none, not wanting to step over Ryan’s feelings by exposing his own vulnerability or making this about him when he hadn’t earned that, had done the exact opposite.

He couldn’t stand the feeling of Ryan holding him any longer, he was so unworthy of it, no matter how much he wanted it. He extricated himself, placed a hand carefully on Ryan’s shoulder. “Ryan, where were you?”

“I don’t know, Shane. Nowhere, it felt like. It was just me, I couldn’t hear or see anything, really, just emptiness,” Ryan’s eyes were wide, his hands twisting nervously. 

Shane was struck by a terrible feeling that Ryan fully expected that Shane wouldn’t believe him. He couldn’t respond, shame twisting him up inside. He wanted to wrap his arms around Ryan, beg for forgiveness where he deserved none, but he just waited for Ryan to continue.

“All that time I was gone, I knew I should have been thinking about ways to get out of there so I could kill you for getting me into this, for always pushing so hard and treating everything like a joke, for landing me in that fucking shadow realm I couldn’t find the way out of. But all I could think was what if I never made it back, what if I never saw you again?”

Shane felt like he imagined it would feel to be punched, not just once, but repeatedly, the last metaphorical blow nearly knocking him off his feet. He knew he had to say something, but nothing felt big enough. 

He brought his other hand to Ryan’s shoulder, looked down to his eyes shining with tears, and ducked his head. “God, Ryan,” he whispered, afraid to say anything else, to take advantage of Ryan’s vulnerability, to have read things wrong and blow this all apart after they’d made it this far.

“Everyone and everything in my life that I would have lost, and I only thought about you, Shane. You and your dumb laugh and your smile, and the way I’m always trying to earn them, and that I never told you how much I loved them.”

Shane found that his face was wet again as he stared down at Ryan, incredulous and wondering how far he was going to take this. His hands sweated where they still rested on Ryan’s shoulders, but he didn’t dare to move. Half of him wondered if none of the past few moments had been real, if the Goatman was fucking with his head, and he didn’t want to let go of the dream if it was one.

“If you don’t come down here soon, Shane, I’m gonna feel pretty fucking stupid,” Ryan grinned and laughed wetly, swiping his hand over his eyes to wipe away tears.

Shane pulled his hands down to swipe them on his jeans before bringing them back up to cup Ryan’s face, leaning down to close the distance between them and bring his lips to Ryan’s. He let Ryan take things from there, once again wrapping his arms around Shane, pulling him closer and deepening the kiss, both memorizing the new feeling for as long as they could before coming up for air.

Shane knew it was his turn to be vulnerable, the least he could do for Ryan when he didn’t deserve a damn thing he’d been given by him. “I’m so sorry, Ryan. I love you. You’re always so brave, and I’ve treated it like a joke when I’m the biggest fucking coward, and I nearly lost you because of it.” He sniffled and swiped angrily at both eyes.

“Shane, you idiot, that’s part of what I love about you. You help me be brave with your stupid-ass comments, you keep me laughing when I wanna scream and run out of whatever terrifying place we’re in. Just, y’know, maybe keep the demonic taunting to a minimum.” Ryan laughed and wiped at his eyes again.

Ryan’s words brought Shane’s mind back to his promise to the Goatman. He briefly wondered if these few amazing moments were the last good ones they’d ever have, now that he’d have to tell Ryan that he had promised away the biggest thing in both their lives. He brought a hand to the back of his neck and looked down at the ground, swiping one foot back and forth as he tried to find the right way to tell Ryan.

Ryan obviously noticed his reaction, the awkward silence. “Shane? What’s wrong?”

“No more taunting, Ryan. Show’s over, you know that. I met the goddamn Goatman. He’s real, and he literally read my thoughts, so who the fuck knows what else is real? I can’t be your skeptic anymore.” Shane tried not to look utterly defeated, knowing that no matter how Ryan felt about him, Unsolved surely meant more.

Ryan brought a hand up to Shane’s jaw and, inexplicably, smiled. “I don’t give a shit about that, Shane. You and me--we’re the show. And I’ve got a lot more ideas if you’re willing to come along with me.”

Shane laughed, still nervous, yet giddy with relief. “It’s worked pretty well for me so far, why not?” 

Shane wasn’t sure how he’d gotten this lucky, but as long as he had Ryan, the rest of the details would work themselves out.

**Author's Note:**

> [find me on tumblr](https://onedamnangryfrog.tumblr.com/), I don't reblog shyan bc I'm fandom old and paranoid about watcher being on there, but I give likes and I love asks/messages!


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